The Federal Aviation Administration has issued requirements that flight decks of commercial aircraft meet new ballistic and intrusion criteria. Interior components such as flight deck doors and panels have been reinforced with ballistic resistant materials to comply with these mandated requirements. In aircraft design, factors such as pay-load capacity, fuel economy and safety are important considerations. Therefore, materials are generally selected that provide a high strength-to-weight ratio.
A typical fastener for ballistic proof and armored panels is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,438,908. Some ballistic proof panels have specialized fasteners as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,600,084. Many of these fasteners were not designed to be tamper proof and may be heavier than need be. While these fasteners may be adequate for their applications, fasteners for flight deck doors of a commercial passenger aircraft require a high strength-to-weight ratio, and also that they should not be able to be disassembled from the passenger cabin side of flight deck door. Therefore, the need exists for a locking fastener system for ballistic resistant panels and doors for commercial passenger aircraft applications that compliments the resistance capabilities of the ballistic panels, and which further cannot be disassembled from the passenger compartment side of the flight deck door.